Title: This Year...
Summary: Do genuine kisses exist in a world of plastic mistletoe?
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters, or any mistletoe for that matter. Please don't sue. :)
Challenge: What I want to see: Lorelai with lots of mistletoe. I definitely don't want: Kirk with lots of mistletoe (shudder)
Well, I had to scrap my Kirk-with-a-sprig-of-mistletoe-strapped-to-his-belt scene ( I love The Office), but I hope you'll be pleased with the end result.
She loved the holidays. She loved snow and lights and Christmas and gingerbread. The loved the smell of cinnamon and evergreen. She loved the angel that she and Rory placed on the top of the tree every year, always arguing about who would get to do the honor, always conceding to the other thereby sparking another feud.
But she especially loved mistletoe. At least, she used to.
She got her first kiss by mistletoe. Ah, yes, she could remember it 25 years later as if it were yesterday...
It was the middle of December; the last day of school before winter break. Lorelai was in the fourth grade and her teacher had thrown the students a party in holiday festivus complete with a sprig of mistletoe hung above the classroom door. Upon seeing the mistletoe, Lorelai decided it would be a terrible waste to not make use of it. So, being the conservationist that she is, Young Lorelai grabbed Tommy Anderson and planted a wet one right on his lips.
Tommy began to cry. She was a little offended by that.
Lorelai got sent to the principle's office and spent the rest of the party staring at her shoes and thinking about what she had done.
In that day, private schools weren't big fans of PDA.
Okay, in retrospect, that wasn't the most ideal mistletoe memory. Come to think of it, all of them had a certain bitter twinge to it.
1980, Shelly's Christmas party, when Bobby "Brace-Face" McKey cornered her under the taunting plant.
1983, her mother's holiday gala, when Jim and Cecile's pizza-faced son, Toby, insisted that she came over to look at his new turtle shell glasses, luring her into a trap as the leafy sprig laughed mercilessly above her.
And of course, there was the incident just last year when she and Bootsy had a near-collision in aisle 4 of Doose's Market, leaving them standing awkwardly under a green sprout of mistletoe.
He made the first move. Lorelai instinctively hit him with a box of Cheese Nips. It's what any self-respecting woman would've done.
Past happenings aside, the idea of, the sheer wonder of mistletoe still gave her butterflies. That one day, the perfect man would catch her at the perfect moment under the perfect cluster of mistletoe, scooping her up in his muscular arms and giving her the sweetest, most passionate kiss of her life. The sun sets in the background. The chilled, winter wind blows through her long, chocolate locks. He pulls back, they lock eyes. Fade scene.
This had yet to happen.
But she was not discouraged! Everyone has to kiss a few toads before they find their prince, right? Right.
Smiling gleefully, she opened the box, pulling the red tissue paper aside to reveal a modest-sized bunch of mistletoe. Standing carefully, handling the flower as if it was liable to fall apart with one false move, she climbed the three rungs of the step-ladder and tacked it above her doorway.
This year, she thought.
Cue the wind machine, folks; sunset on standby. 'Cause this year, Lorelai would have her kiss, come hell or high water.
Hope you enjoyed it!